Meet Gustav the Pumpkin! I made him at Cheetah Fest. I think he is so adorable. He looks so happy like he wants to give you a hug :) I didn’t realize how ready I was for fall but the second the weather got colder, discount I switched into autumn mode! With the colder weather, I’ve been able to get in the Christmas spirit (don’t roll your eyes people, it’s only 82 days away!) and I love being able to sleep with my windows open, cuddled under the covers.

Last year I made pumpkin muffins a lot from this recipe and they always turned out amazing. I would end up eating them for every meal! I haven’t actually made pumpkin bread out of this recipe but I wanted to make something for one of my teachers as a thank you for writing me a letter of recommendation, so I decided to make this bread (crossing my fingers the whole time that she likes pumpkin bread…she said she did :) I didn’t eat any of this, but it smelled delicious and I’m looking forward to making some muffins for myself soon! *Update: My teacher says she loved it! She usually doesn’t like pumpkin bread but she liked this. Success!

This bread always turns out super not-dry and has great pumpkin/fall flavor! It’s really easy to make, too, which is always a plus. It gets better as it ages so enjoy eating is warm out of the oven and for days after!

I would really encourage you to make this soon, it’s really really tasty.

Pumpkin Bread/Muffins

NOTE: This makes 24 muffins or 3 small (7 by 3in) loaves of bread. You can also halve the recipe to get one loaf of larger (8.5 by 4.5 in) bread or 12 muffins.

Ingredients:

1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree

4 eggs

1 cup vegetable oil

2/3 cup water

3 cups white sugar

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

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Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare your bread pans or muffins tins by spraying them with pam. For the bread loaf, I cut a square of parchment paper in the bottom as well. With muffins, you can use liners or just spray the pan really well.

In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water, and sugar until well blended. In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger.

Slowly stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended and pour them into the prepared bread pans or use an ice cream scoop to put it in the muffin tins.

If you’re making the smaller loaves, bake for 50 minutes. If you’re making the muffins, bake for about 20 minutes. If you’re baking a larger loaf, bake for about 60 minutes. The bread is done when a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.